'Active Archiving' is key for accessible, online archives

The Active Archive Alliance has announced a new research study that finds organizations are deploying active archives to keep ever growing data sets online, indexed and accessible without the costs and resources associated with primary storage.

The study detailed in the July 2011 Aberdeen Group research report, “Archive Agility: Building Business Resilience through Active Archiving,” shows that organizations today recognize the knowledge and business value of archived information and the importance of keeping it accessible.

Active archiving is the process of removing a set of infrequently used reference data from an overloaded relational database and keeping it active in an archive where it can be easily and quickly retrieved when needed.

The report details how technology industry leaders are solving data management and accessibility concerns for big data, cloud and archive data by leveraging active archiving solutions. Broadcasters have increased their use of online archiving in recent months. For example, a multi-station project is archiving news footage online in the Boston television market.

The study identified the following top four pressures that are driving organizations to archive data. They include: too much historical information and data growth; cost to keep data active and accessible; takes too long for end users to gain access to historical data; and the rising cost of managing litigation and compliance.

“Our research shows that best-in-class archiving organizations have active archives which provide their end users with fast and reliable access to historical data,” said Dick Csaplar, senior research analyst, Aberdeen Group. “The research also strongly supports the use of archiving standards that are supported by multiple companies to protect archives from being orphaned when a single company abandons one of their technologies.”

The Active Archive Alliance has emerged as the leading advocate of active archiving standards, processes and products. It supports active archive solutions that help ensure data integrity with data management features that include self healing, data integrity verification and strong interoperability amongst participating active archive vendors.